Dark Lady
by Matrix Refugee
Summary: Road to Perdition Nitti sends Maguire after a Gypsy queen who's made one dire prediction too many about the Capone gang...


+J.M.J.+  
  
Dark Lady  
  
by "Matrix Refugee"  
  
Author's Note:  
  
(If you haven't read them, you might want to read the three stories which proceed this:  
  
"A Slaying Song Tonight", at http://www.fanfiction.net/read.php?storyid=1145343   
  
"My Funny Valentine" at http://www.fanfiction.net/read.php?storyid=1208074  
  
and "Hot Time in the Old Town" at http://www.fanfiction.net/read.php?storyid=1473305 )  
  
I got the idea for this while hearing Cher's "Dark Lady". Don't ask my why, but I got this wild image of Maguire and a Gypsy queen. The story ended up hitting the rating roof for sex, splatter and horror, so I had to tone it down for ff.n. What else did you expect from that hitman for all seasons?!  
  
Disclaimer:  
  
I don't own Road to Perdition, its characters (certainly NOT Maguire), concepts, or other indicia, which are the property of Sam Mendes, Max Allen Collins, David Self, DreamWorks SKG, 20th Century Fox, et al.   
  
* * * * * * * *  
  
The cold October wind whistled through an open window in the flat as Maguire stepped out of the dark room with the latest batch of prints, ready for his respective editors.  
  
"Here, what kind of Halloween trick is this supposed to be?" he demanded, as Bridie climbed in through the window, her black shawl over her head, a clay plant pot full of dead geraniums under her arm.  
  
"I've been meaning to get that off the fire escape and I didn't want the goblins to do it for me," she said, setting the pot on the floor and closing the window.  
  
"You think they'd climb up and grab it?" he asked.  
  
"Something like that is fair game," she said, taking off her shawl. "Last thing we need is someone throwing it through the window." She glanced out at the fading daylight. "It's getting on toward twilight. The witching hour's about to start."  
  
"It's not goblins I'd worry about; I'd worry about something a lot less innocent," Maguire said, hunting up a couple manila envelopes and slipping the photos into them.  
  
"As in Connor? Last I knew he's back in Rock Island," she said, heading into the tiny closet of a kitchen, where she had a stew cooking on the gas ring.  
  
"If I had a choice of what would come crashing through that window, I'd choose a flowerpot over a bullet," he said, marking the envelopes.  
  
"Either way, I don't want flying glass falling all over us," she said. Since the summer, they'd moved to a smaller furnished apartment, two rooms, a kitchen and a remote bath they had to share with two other couples. Maguire had turned the bedroom into a dark room -- with Bridie's help -- which obliged them to move the bed into the main room. But they never had any visitors except his sister, who wouldn't notice something like that."  
  
As he was closing the flaps on the envelopes, the phone rang. He turned and picked it up, perching himself on the arm of the sofa.  
  
"Harlen Maguire," he asnswered.  
  
"This is Frank Nitti. Did you have any plans for the night?"  
  
"No. Herself wants to stay put in case any goblins are around, but I had some photos to deliver."  
  
"Take care of that, but take the long way home. There's a ... difficult job Al wants you do for us."  
  
"Why, what makes it difficult?" Maguire said, lowering his voice slightly and pulling a pad from a drawer of the phone table.  
  
"Maybe I'd better explain it first. There's this Gypsy fortuneteller who's been making some ... threatening predictions about Al."  
  
"Well, they might just not come true, you know how these things go."  
  
A pause on the other end of the line. "That's the problem. She's rarely wrong. She's saying Ness is gonna back Al into a corner in a few years, so Al wants her permanently silenced. There's seven hundred in it for you if you see to it she never makes another prediction."  
  
"Consider it done. Where can I find this?"  
  
"That's the hard part. She's hard to find, but she'll find you if you walk along Wells Street, outside the Gypsy Tearoom. She rides in a black Packard. She's got this... thing for finding young men on the street."  
  
Maguire jotted this down. "What does she look like?"  
  
"I've never actually seen her. Very few people in the city have, except the guys she picks up."  
  
"All right, does anyone know what she looks like?"  
  
"One of Al's boys, Enzo, boasted that he'd seen her face, claims she'd told him exactly how he was going to die, while she was loving him up."  
  
"And...?"  
  
"She claimed he'd be stabbed to death in a fight over a woman. Sure enough, a week later, he got stuck through the throat in a cathouse down by the river."  
  
"In that case, I'll be careful not to get that close. Not liable to happen anyway: I got my own company waiting at home."  
  
"One other thing: be sure to bring your camera along: Al wants photos."  
  
"Will do." Maguire had been doodling a black cat on the pad: he drew it's legs pointing up in the air.  
  
"Whatever happens, don't let her suspect. And don't let her dig her claws into you."  
  
"I can handle that."  
  
They hung up. Maguire tore the page off the pad and stuffed it into his vest pocket, glancing toward the kitchen. "Bridie?"  
  
"Yeah?" his life's partner called, stepping out of the kitchen.  
  
"Don't hold supper for me, I might be late."  
  
A questioning pucker showed between her brows. "Oh?"  
  
"Boss wanted me to get some shots of the Halloween scene, and there's something funny going on down on Wells Street."  
  
"Someone's Halloween trick gone awry?"  
  
"Something like that, I didn't get all the details."  
  
"What should I do with your share of the stew?"  
  
"Oh, dump it in a bowl and keep it warm on the radiator," he said, joining her in the doorway.  
  
She ran a fingertip under his chin. "Don't stay out too late: I don't want the goblins to catch you."  
  
He grinned. "I'll just stare 'em down: that should be enough to scare them off. Or else they might think I'm one of them."  
  
She slugged his shoulder. "Oh stop that!" She pulled him close and kissed him.  
  
* * * * * *  
  
Darkness had closed in by the time he got to Wells Street, taking the long route back to the apartment. He'd seen some costumed revellers on their way to various celebrations throughout the city. In some ways, as far as he was concerned, he'd outgrown Halloween. The costume parties were for those who were more socially inclined and playing wild pranks on people rightly belonged to the young folks. But he could say, in some ways, he had a touch of Halloween every day, when you considered his realm of expertise. What else was the meaning of this night than being able to look death and horror in the face and reply with a hearty chuckle? He looked it in the eye every day with a fascinated albeit straight face. Just the very fact that most people preferred to turn away from it, or sterilize this most basic fact of human fragility made it all the more fascinating to him.  
  
His mind roused itself from these musings. A long Packard, gleaming black in the dim streetlights had slowed down alongside him, following him. He pretended not to notice and kept walking at his regular pace.  
  
Out of the corner of his eye, he watched the darkened window roll down.  
  
"Are you going somewhere, young man?" asked a woman's voice, mellow, deep, but as soft as black velvet.  
  
He paused, looking in the direction of that voice. The car stopped alongside him. "Not exactly, just taking the long way home."  
  
"Would you care to idle a moment on a side road?" she asked.  
  
He peered into the window. All he could see was a large black cat curled up on what he took to be a red damask pillow, but which he realized was the woman's lap. A heady perfume flowed out the open window, caressing his nostrils.  
  
"Nah, my mother warned me not to accept a ride from any unfamiliar ladies on Halloween."  
  
The woman chuckled lightly. "You look a little old for that."  
  
"Still. You might be a witch."  
  
"I might be," she replied. "But you must realize that witches are only the wise women whom the ignorant fear even when there is no reason to fear."  
  
The car door opened as if by itself. He stepped into the car and sank down onto the leather upholstery beside her. She reached across his lap, pulled the door closed and rolled up the window, shutting out the streetlights. But not before he noticed the scratches on the upholstery, and a red stain that might have been wine, or something thicker.  
  
"Home, James," she ordered. The driver, unseen behind the divider, hit the gas. The car jerked forward and around a corner, forcing Maguire against the woman at his side. He slid back, away from her.  
  
"You were looking for me," she said.  
  
"What makes you say that?" he asked.  
  
Her dress rustled as she stirred in the shadows. "I have my ways of knowing. When I looked out at you, you seemed glad to see me."  
  
"Could have been a pistol in my pocket," he said, his hand feeling the .38 in his jacket pocket, well-hidden under his topcoat.  
  
She laughed, this time with a husky note to the sound. "And does this witty young man have a name?"  
  
"It's Harlen Maguire," he said. "But who are you?"  
  
"I've had more names than you can imagine. But they say anonymity adds flavor to any encounter."  
  
He felt a soft, sweet-scented but firm hand take hold of his. Warm breath fanned the skin of his fingers. He obliged her and raised her fingers to his lips, but he kept his sense of direction wary: she'd hardly be in a position to offer him a lift back once he was done.  
  
The car turned, slowly this time, and stopped. The engine cut out.  
  
The rear door opened from the outside. Maguire got out, helping the mysterious woman out of the back.  
  
When she stood up, the top of her head was just level with his chin. She looked up at him, her dark eyes peering up from a heart-shaped face with golden-brown skin. The black fur mantle she wore enveloped her slender frame, but it did nothing to hide the curves of her form.  
  
The driver, a tall, brooding but otherwise non-descript man in his late fifties, led the way up to the house, a large, rambling brick Victorian, the windows dark except for a lamp that glowed in one on an upper story.  
  
Once they reached the foyer and the driver had closed the door, the dark ladylet Maguire remove her cloak. Underneath it she wore a sleek scarlet dress molded over her form, a sight which, he had to admit, distracted him so much he hardly noticed when the manservant took the cloak from him.  
  
"You like what you have seen?" she asked, looking up at Maguire.  
  
"Excuse me for staring," he said. "I'm a photographer, so I can hardly help noticing... things."  
  
She smiled at him. "Come. There are things I've noticed about you that you might like to know."  
  
She took up a lighted candleabra which stood on a table nearby and tucking up her skirts, led him up the stairs to a second-floor parlor. Maybe it was just the lighting, but he thought he saw only one shadow, his own bowler-hatted one, sliding along the wall as they climbed the stairs.  
  
As they stepped into the room, the candlelight fell over a table covered with a black damask tablecloth which dominated the center of the room. The flames on the candles guttered as she moved about the room, then steadied as she set it down on a sidetable. She took one candle and moved along the walls, lighting more candles, in sconces, on a mantelpiece, framing a portrait of an aging man, below which, on the hearth, the coals of a banked fire glimmered. Black and violet hangings covered the walls and the windows.  
  
"If you will excuse me for a moment, Mr. Maguire, I'll slip into something more comfortable," she said. She pulled a violet cord, parting the portiere which covered a doorway at the head of the room. Before she lowered the curtains again, Maguire got a glimpse into the next room, a boudoir really, the ebony post of a rich bed covered with a violet quilt.  
  
Whoever she was, she lived well, probably some Ruritanian princess living in self-imposed exile. He ranged about the room, taking it all in.  
  
In the drawer of an armoire by the door, he found several Taroc decks, a planchette and a pot of sweet-smelling lumps that might have been incense.  
  
Something rustled behind the portiere. He closed the drawer quickly and quietly and turned.  
  
She stepped into the room, clad in robe of violet brocade, belted about her slim waist with a silver cord, but the neck of the robe was open below her neck, revealing the curve of her bosom. She approached the armoire, opening the drawer and took out some of the incense.  
  
"You're unsure of this place?" she asked.  
  
"I'm not in the habit of letting mysterious ladies take me home," he said.  
  
She smiled, but the smile took on a strangely brutal sweetness. She turned and going to the hearth, stirred up the fire and tossed the incense onto the slowly growing flames. After a moment, the scent drifted into the room.  
  
"You are afraid when there is nothing to fear," she said, turning back to him. "I know why you were looking for me."  
  
She'd better not be a mind reader, he realized. "You do?"  
  
"You have heard that I can read men's futures, in the palms of their hands or by a deck of cards." she beckoned him to approach the table. "Come. Sit. Listen."  
  
He sat down only when she had seated herself. She reached across the table top and took his hand in hers. She started by trying to flex his hand at the wrist. He resisted her.  
  
"You are a stronger man than most people think you to be, yet you conceal your strength. Wise man."  
  
"I'm a reporter. People open up better when they don't see me as a threat, but my particular brand of journalism takes me into some pretty rough places," he admitted.  
  
She studied his hand as she laid it out on the table. She fell silent for a long while. He swore he could feel her gaze carressing his palm. At length, she spoke. "Your lifeline is middle-length: Your health is fair enough, but you're wiry. However, it runs shallow: You won't live long, but you'll live long enough."   
  
He didn't like the sound of that, but then again, the Maguires weren't known for longevity.  
  
She went on. "Your hands are long and your fingers are thick though the rest of you is slender. A sign of a hard worker and a generous heart."  
  
He shrugged. "I do my part as much as I can. I found a roof to put over my lady-friend's head."  
  
"And to speak of her: the Venus line isn't very long or noticeable. You haven't been lucky in love most of youi life."  
  
"No, I'm afraid," he admitted.  
  
"And the love you do have may be undone by the guile of a man."  
  
No, not Connor again, he thought. Bridie's half-crazed cousin Connor, John Rooney's son had been known to eye Bridie up and down whenever he encountered her in the city, but would that turn into something more than covetous looks?  
  
He had to keep focused. She might be able to sense what he was up to. She might be saying this just to get him riled up so she could wriggle free when he moved in. Besides, who could really see the future?  
  
"Perhaps," he said, conning her into thinking he was really listening, "It might be wise if I got out now, while it's still safe."  
  
"Perhaps," she agreed, softest.  
  
He felt her gaze on his face, caressing him. For a long moment, he resisted it. But the sensation grew too intense for him to resist forever. He looked up.  
  
Their eyes met: grey-green to brown.  
  
Before he could move, she slid her hand up his, her fingertips caressing the hairs on the back of his wrist before sliding up onto his sleeve. He tried to pull away, but he seemed immobilized, as if her touch had frozen him. Or her gaze. Dammit, she put a hoodoo on me! he thought.  
  
He realized the incense smell now filled the room, thickening, filling his nostrils, leaving his senses reeling. She must have drugged the stuff! he thought. She mounted the table and crept across the top toward him, eyes glowing with intent. She lowered herself into his lap, facing him. Her hands slid about his neck, thumbs caressing his throat, her fingers finding the hairs on the back of his head.  
  
An odd smile playing over her face, she leaned her face closer to his. He felt the hairs on the back of his neck rising. He couldn't tell if it was from arousal or fear or a little of both.  
  
Her mouth melded to his. He had parted his lips to voice an objection, but she found them and plunged her tongue into his mouth, carressing his gums with her tonguetip. He felt himself yielding to her, kissing her back even as his wiser nature screamed: NO!  
  
He tried to push her away and get up at the same time, but he only succeeded in knocking the chair over backwards, with her on top of him.  
  
She released his face and looked down at him. "Do you wish to know?" she asked.  
  
"Know....what?" he asked, his lips forming the syllables, but his voice unable to say them.  
  
"Know how it will end?" she asked.  
  
"What... ends?"  
  
She chuckled, an unsettling little purr which sent shivers through his skin. "Your life."  
  
"How?"  
  
"A shot from behind. A man who should have been dying. For some reason, you make the mistake of turning your back on him. You didn't know he was still armed. You didn't know he had the strength left to do it. But there's a way to escape it..." Her hands slid down his torso...  
  
Maybe it was the shock of her words, or maybe it was because he lay on the floor where the air was the densest, but his head cleared enough for him to push her away. He leapt to his feet and reached inside his coat for the .38.  
  
He drew it and took aim at her head, chambering a round.  
  
She sat up and looked at him with a mocking smile. "What do you mean by this?"  
  
"Here's how it ends," he said and pulled the trigger.  
  
She fell back on the carpet, the blood pulsing from the wound in her forehead. She lay unmoving.  
  
He pocketed the pistol and fished his small Kodak out of his other pocket. Hoping the candlelight would be enough, he aimed the camera at her, cranked the film and pressed the shutter button.  
  
He was just sliding the camera into his pocket when he heard a hissing sound. He turned back to the corpse.  
  
She sat up, eyes blazing, unblinking, out of a blood-drenched face. He fumbled the gun out of his pocket and shot her again, in the chest. She slumped back, but after a few seconds, she pulled herself upright, her lips forming curses in a foreign tongue. He shot her in the throat. She fell forward that time, but she managed to pull herself up on her hands and crawl toward him.  
  
He fired again, in the top of her head. She fell but she managed to drag herself toward him on her belly. He fired at her head again, twice. She still lay twitching, but it might only have been his imagination.  
  
He broke open the gun, emptying the spent shells into his coat pocket and reloaded, fingers trembling. He'd have to find an angle to shoot the next photos from, make it presentable for the public. He doubted even Needaker would want a picture that bloody.  
  
But Nitti would want the proof.  
  
A strange sound came from the corpse, a rusty, whinging cry: "....eeeecchh...."  
  
The corpse had turned over on its side, looking up at him with eyes like fire. He fired again, putting a bullet through each eye. God, what *was* she? A werewolf or something like that? Would he need silver bullets to kill her? They didn't exactly sell those at Woolworth's and he if he got Bridie to help him melt down some silverware, she'd start asking questions he didn't want to answer.  
  
The corpse lay still, but he wasn't sure if it was really dead. He pocketed the gun and drew out the camera again. He circled her so that the leg of the chair blocked the view of the head. Or the mangled lump oozing blood that vaguely resembled a head. He cranked the film and clicked the shutter button. That should satisfy his editor. And Nitti.  
  
He examined himself. He'd lucked out: He hadn't gotten any blood on his clothes. He cocked an ear, listening in case "James" had heard anything and was rushing to defend his mistress. He expected to hear footsteps pounding up ther stairs or a siren blaring in the near distance, but he heard nothing.  
  
He let himself out the way he had come in, pausing only to take off his shoes as he passed through the hallways, so he would not give himself away to any other denizens of the house.  
  
Once outside in the cold, he slipped them on and headed home. He knew the walk home would take the better part of a couple hours, but the cold air would clear his head.  
  
* * * * *   
  
When he let himself into the flat, he found it dark and still, the only sounds disturbing the stillness were the radiator pinging softly and Bridie's quiet breathing from the bed. He went straight to the dark room to replace the gun behind the cameras on the shelves and to develop the prints.  
  
Alone under the comforting glow of the red light, he worked quickly, a task he had performed thousands of times before and which he would repeat thousands of times yet.  
  
Unless the Gypsy was right and he made a false move during one of Nitti's side-jobs for him.  
  
He snorted to himself as he set about examining the negatives, before making the prints. All utter nonsense...  
  
Nothing.  
  
The negatives weren't blank: There was the table leg, there was the circle of candlelight. There were huge dark stains on the carpet (rendered white on the film), but where in hell was the body?!  
  
Probably just a trick of the light. It would show up when he developed the prints.  
  
But as he lifted the damp prints from the rinse tray and hung them up to dry, he nearly cried out in shock.  
  
The body hadn't shown up on the prints either.  
  
He backed away in shock and bumped into a half-empty can of chemicals on the table behind him. It clattered to the floor, splashing the contents all over him. He cursed, loud enough that Bridie had probably heard him.  
  
"Harl?" she called from the other room. From the sleepy note to her voice, he gathered that he had just awakened her. Even still, he jolted at her voice.  
  
"It's all right," he called to her. "I'm in the dark room."  
  
He limped out, going for the wash room, where he scrubbed his hands, getting the chemicals off them.  
  
He glanced up at his face in the mirror. Reddish flecks covered the left half of his reflected face. He thought at first the flecks came from the rusting pipe that ran across the ceiling, but when he tried to wipe them off the mirror, he discovered the flecks appeared to be on his face. Dammit, he'd gotten blood on himself after all. He wiped a hand over his face.  
  
Nothing. No red on his palm when he drew it away.  
  
He looked at his reflection again. He saw it as it usually looked, unmarked, a little paler even than it usually was and his eyes shiny with fear, but the same visage he always saw.  
  
He shook his head to clear it, reached up to switch out the light and went back to the front room.  
  
Bridie turned over under the covers as he sat down on the foot of the bed to remove his shoes. "You okay, Harl?"  
  
"Say what?!" he asked, jolting at the sound of her voice.  
  
"You're shaking like a leaf in the wind out there and your face is as white as your shirt," she said.   
  
"In that case, they need to get better bleach at the Chinese laundry," he said, trying to joke.  
  
She sat up, looking at him. "Be serious with me, Harlen."  
  
He'd have to come clean. "I don't know if I'm off my nut or my eyes are going bad or what it is. This Gypsy dame over on the West Side got her face shot to shreds in someone's house. Some nut must have kept shooting at her point blank: her head was more wound than head. I know I saw it. I know I took pictures of it. But she didn't show up on the prints."  
  
"Bad film?" she asked.  
  
"I started the roll this morning, everything else on it printed fine. On the prints of the dead Gypsy, you can see the blood stains on the rug, but you can't see her."  
  
Bridie dropped her gaze to her hands thoughtfully. After a long moment of silence, she looked up. "Then it may not have been a woman."  
  
"It sure looked like a woman, unless it was a short guy who had strange ideas about Halloween costumes. Hey, maybe it was and someone shot him to bits to keep him from corrupting their son."  
  
"You're being awful!"  
  
"Right, sorry. But how did she "not* come out on film?"  
  
Bridie looked up. "It might not have been human."  
  
"Then what in hell was it?"  
  
She made the Sign of the Cross. "It might have been a vampyre. They don't have reflections or cast shadows, so it stands to reason that they would be hard to photograph."  
  
He looked at Bridie narrowly. "A vampyre? In Chicago? This is the 1920s, Bridie."  
  
"I know... but some things like that never really go away."  
  
"No wonder the guy that shot her had to practically shoot her mug clean off."  
  
Bridie scooted over to him and nuzzled her face into his neck. "Speaking of vampyres, I wouldn't mind having my neck bitten right about now."  
  
"Sorry, bank's closed," he said.  
  
* * * * *  
  
"Damned if I know what it means," Nitti said, shaking his head as he studied Maguire's abortive photos. "If the police hadn't found the body this morning, this would be a whole other matter entirely."  
  
"I printed several versions of the same shot, ran different filters, blew it up, made it smaller, different washes. Same thing."  
  
Nitti leaned back in his chair, looking at Maguire. He raised one finger in warning. "Not a word of this to anyone. Al's satisfied with the work, now that the police found the corpse. But if anyone finds out you were linked to it..."  
  
"That won't happen."  
  
Nitti fixed him with a glance. "You say you have a ladyfriend now. Who is she?"  
  
"John Rooney's niece Bridie."  
  
"Does she know?"  
  
"That I work for you? No. Even if she did, I doubt it would faze her in the least. She has Rooney's Angel of Death for a godfather. She faced down Connor Rooney in an argument and actually *lived* to tell the tale."  
  
Nitti smiled thinly. "A remarkable lady, then. Can she keep quiet?"  
  
"Of course she could. She's in love with me."  
  
Nitti unlocked a drawer of the desk. "But what about you? Are you in love with her?"  
  
"I let her hang around, so I suppose I must be," Maguire replied, shrugging one shoulder.  
  
Nitti took a checkbook from the drawer. "You don't sound too sure of your own feelings. Just as well: don't get too attached, in case you should have to move on."  
  
"That's unlikely -- my getting attached, that is."  
  
Nitti filled out the check, detatched it and handed it to Maguire. But before Maguire could take it, he drew it away, just out of reach. "There's a small bonus for your trouble. Just don't let Bridie know where it came from."  
  
"I keep hold of the purse strings anyway," Maguire said.  
  
Satisfied, Nitti handed him the check.  
  
* * * * *  
  
As Maguire left Nitti's office and headed for the elevator, a small group of chambermaids passed him in the hallway. One small one, whose grey uniform and white apron barely concealed her shapely form looked right at him with lerge dark eyes glowing from a honey-colored face.  
  
He quickened his pace to the elevator.  
  
* * * * *  
  
Afterword:  
  
I'm starting a new job soon, so I may be a little slow getting the next story in this series out, especially since I have a dozen other writing projects going right now! But it will come in it's own time. 


End file.
